Want to get a handle on your finances and keep better books? Try these five simple steps. While I’m the geekier math person in our family, I’m still not an impeccable bookkeeper. I’m getting better at it, though. I think part of that is because I love the lady who prepares our tax returns. I […]

I had the benefit of having Crystal as my personal finance coach back when we lived both lived in Kansas City. The FishFam was in the hole and trying to climb out. We met Crystal and Jesse in the midst of it. And Crystal was a source of great encouragement during that time. We chased kids together, washed dishes, and talked about ways to pinch a penny.

Having known Crystal for several years, I know that she is expert at stretching a buck.

Money Saving Mom was one of the means that God used to help us get out of debt a few years ago. I have personally tested many of her recommendations and know that they work. While we may disagree on some fine points (like I won’t use cash to pay for gas ’cause I don’t want to walk into the station), the common ground is vast.

You cannot go wrong in reading her book and taking her advice to heart!

The Money Saving Mom’s Budget is part of our Booking It List for next month when we’ll be discussing it in-depthly as a group. But, sometimes it’s hard to get a book when it’s a new release. Libraries don’t always have them right away and when they do, there’s often a long waiting list.

So, how great that I have five copies to give away!

To Enter:

Leave a comment on this post, naming one of your financial goals for this year.

So that the winners have a chance to claim, receive, and read their books before we discuss it next month, this promotion will only be open for a short time.

This promotion is open until Thursday, January 12th, at 8 pm PST and is limited to US residents, 18 years or older. The winners will be chosen randomly and notified via email. Please respond within 48 hours to claim your prize. This post will be updated with the beginning of the winner’s email addresses. The prize for this promotion is provided by and shipped by Money Saving Mom and/or its representatives. Jessica Fisher and Life as MOM will not be held responsible for unclaimed or undelivered prizes.

THIS GIVEAWAY IS NOW CLOSED. CONGRATS TO THE WINNERS: holbrookmail@, chickfilamom@, lindsey.m.bell@, family.wells@, kawiggains@

Disclosure: I received an advance copy of this book and this post does contain affiliate links. However, all opinions are my own. I would tell you about this book, anyway.

Comments

One of my goals is to pay cash for a new appliance. It may be the hot water tank, refrigerator or stove, not sure which one yet. It’s going to depend which seems to be closer to the junk yard when I have the cash available, but they all 3 really need replaced soon. Thanks for the giveaway!

Well, I am a new convert to your website and I absolutely LOVE it! I am going to make my get out of debt plan this year, I already have started my envelope plan! One of my financial goals for the year is to pay off my single credit card and purchase a new to me car with cash!!!

Thanks for all the great info on your website, I started reading my One Bite at a Time this morning!!!

My financial goal this year is to use more coupons and save more of my hard earned money. Also, to continue following the Dave Ramsey Steps to Financial Freedom and pay off the rest of our credit card debt this year.

We paid off over $8500 in debt last year, along with paying cash for our storage barn. This year we plan on paying off our vehicle loan and credit cards, get our emergency fund up and pay cash for a new-to-us lawn mover and pick-up.

My financial goal is to pay off my car (which happens in 3 weeks) lol. But seriously, we (as a family) are really digging into the meal planning to help save time/ money. Also we will be putting out a massive garden that my extended family is going to help with. I hope this helps not only me but at least a dozen other family members financially as well!

One of my big goals this year is to pay off some credit card debt that feels like a black cloud hanging over me, ugh! I took a peek at some pages in this book and think it looks fabulous. If I don’t win it I am going to do my best to earn enough Swagbucks to get it through Amazon. Thanks for running this contest!

One of my financial goals is to eat healthier as a family without wasting. Too often things get busy, produce gets tossed, and pizza gets ordered. I am trying more meal planning in advance and freezer cooking to avoid this. I follow both of you on Facebook.

One of our financial goals this year is to get some of our debt paid off. We will be putting our tax return towards our one credit card. I will also be working extra hard (I work from home) so that we can pay down his student loans.

I got laid off in 09 and still haven’t found a permanent job. I’m contracting right now and it’s ending soon. My financial goal is to keep the bills paid and hopefully not add any new debit while I’m looking for another job.

My financial goal overlaps my clutter goals of going as paperless as possible. It is so much easier to find a scanned copy than to search through a box of receipts. Improving my computer backups goes right along with this goal for obvious reasons. Thanks!

My goal is to be debt free (Finally!) by the end of this month and to remain debt free all year by staying on budget and paying cash. As a single mom of 4 kiddos, I need to be a good steward of our blessings. I also follow both of you on Facebook and this blog.

My main goal is to increase our savings. Things are steadily getting more expensive but my husband’s salary is not growing. I feel like our bank account has been steadily dwindling and I would like some more “cushion.”

One of the goals I have for the new year is to “write down” an actual budget using the worksheet from “The Moneysaving Mom’s Budget” that I was able to download recently. No more relying just on my brain space to juggle my family’s budget

I want to stick to my grocery budget! We’re really struggling and sickness and other health issues have broken our bank account. In those times it’s easy to go over budget because of circumstances. No more!

My financial goal for this year is to get my credit card paid off and not max it out again 3 months later…The payments are killing us! $50 a month and only $20 of it is going towards the actual balance after finance charges!

Our goal is to get out of debt, except for our house! We are currently working on Dave Ramsey’s Baby Step 2 – that’s why I NEED to win a copy. The money just isn’t in the budget to go buy it right now!

My financial goal for this year..not to use credit card..I did this last year, and even better, my husband as well but not until December came. He used his credit card for me to buy gifts. I will save Christmas gifts early so I don’t have to run out of time and pay full price for gifts

ONe financial goal this year is continue saving Baby step 4b – for a house! Totally inspired by Crystal, we hope to save a much cash as possible for a house! (not this year mind you, just gonna continue saving…;)

My biggest financial goal this year is to transition to using cash only for most of our shopping. I think it will make a huge difference. I’ve been trying to use cash for groceries, but I think it will “hurt” more to use cash for everything!

Our goal this year is to add another $12,000 to our savings account. Saving up for a large down payment on our next house. You and Crystal both inspire me to a better wife, mother and home manager. I read both of your blogs (well, both of yours and hers) every single day.

Our financial goal for the year is continue working on both of our Masters degrees with absolutely no debt while also saving for our first home and future children! We are determined but need all the advice we can get

We hope to be able to have extra savings to be able to put money in our kids college savings accts & our retirement this year. This means spending even less than we budget along the way &/or selling stuff to have extra money.

One of our goals is to pay off a vehicle we just got in Dec. Our plan was to save up and put a huge down payment down or pay cash for one, but we had to get one sooner than what we had planned. So our loan is for 4 yrs. and our goal is 6-12 months to pay it off.

Our big goal this year is to get rid of our credit card debt. We are in the middle of FPU and it’s been a huge help. Our student loans are a bit much for us to get “debt free” this year, but getting rid of the credit cards would be a start…

My husband and I both chose a “bad habit” we plan on giving up for the year that will save us money. So it works as both a financial goal and New Year’s resolution. In addition, I pre-type up a grocery list before visiting the store and do not stray from it.

Financial goals for this year: save up for a home (downpayment), bigger vehicle, and pay for hubby’s school. He works full-time and goes to seminary full-time. This will be a challenging year as we hope to be moved by this time next year into a home.

My goal is to work out a budget again this year, and see if we can work out a way to live within our income. The husband gets a stipend from school, and that is it for our family of 8. Not easy, but the closer we can get, the better!

We already have our “emergency fund” $1000.00 in the bank…my goal this year is to start working on the 3-6months of living expenses that we want to save. It will mean some sacrifice, but I guess “No pain, no gain”!!

One of my financial goals is to get a grocery price book going. I have to eat gluten free and the cost of groceries is sometimes twice what we used to spend. I need to get some cheaper options figured out.

This year I’m paying off credit cards; and am only going to use 1-2 major credit cards that give a percentage back or offer other incentives. So far, I’ve paid off one major store credit card to “0” and its only Jan.! Thanks!

I am SO excited about this book. It has been getting such great reviews and it’s coming out at a perfect time for my family – I had my first child in November and just gave notice at work that I will not be returning from my leave. Starting January 17, I’ll officially be a stay at home mom! So, we have been thinking hard about our finances and how they will change with just one income.

My first-order-of-business financial goal is to start a college savings account for my new daughter!

We are working hard to save a certain amount each month for college, which is fast approaching for our younger son. We are also working to put a certain amount each month into our older son’s special needs trust.

I am a subscriber to both Life as Mom & Money Saving Mom blogs as well as a follower of both on Facebook. My 2012 financial goals are: finish the 2012 budget/spending map; learn how to use Mint; continue to find ways to spend less to accommodate our ever shrinking income; work on options for earning an at-home income; rely on the Lord to meet our needs and be thankful daily for the little things (like when CVS ECBs cover the cost of my box-o-haircolor).

One goal is to save money to add an addition to the back of our house. To do this, it would help if I could reduce our grocery bill while still eating foods free of high fructose corn syrup and food coloring.

One goal: to be more aware of the “little dollars” going out the door (coffee, nicknacks, disposable toys etc) and save those “little dollars” for a big trip to celebrate 15 years of marriage, this year!

My goal is to stay within budget- every single area of our budget for at least one month. We do *pretty* good on how it averages out, but I tend to go over at least one budget area each month. So it is simple…but I am going to do better!

I really want to make a BIG dent in our total debt and write out an honest-to-goodness budget and make my husband live by it! But we will be getting a slow start at this goal since he lost his job two weeks ago. I need all the help and tips I can find to help us get started on this once he is back to wor

Our financial goal for this year is pay off our second cc. We paid one of just before Christmas 2011 and plan to do the same in 2012. I would love to have a copy of the book to help me along my way. Life as Mom and Money Saving Mom have been amazing helps along the way. Thank you! ~Rebecca

My financial goal is to spend less than $1K per month on groceries. There are 9 in my family and groceries includes all consumables – laundry soap, paper towels, etc as well as food. This book could help!

I plan is to safe money, open saving accounts for both of our girls (for college), and pay the house in the next 2-3 years. I follow you on Facebook Life as Mom and I love it. I learn so much from you in the last few weeks. Avery time I need help with something, I just check your post and almost always found my answer in there. Thank you.

I would LOVE this book…our financial goal for this year is just to get a grip on a budget. We are hoping to adopt, so to figure out how to best spend our money so that we can save is what we’re hoping for.

I’d like to pay cash for a vacation this year. I want to communicate better with my husband about our budget, being more accountable for the “little purchases” that we both do. I hope that by cutting down on the money going out for purchases of little things we could probably do without, we’ll be able to put those little bits into a vacation fund and watch them grow.

After recently paying off a car that doesn’t really work for our family but has retained a good portion of its value, we decided to trade it in for something that will work and pay cash for any difference. That way we can use the old car payment money to pay down debt.

We’d like to pay more on the mortgage while continuing to pay our oldest’s college expenses without loans (using a combination of savings, current cash, and great scholarships). Child #2 starts college in fall 2013——we hope to continue without loans!

My goal is to eat more healthfully without having to change our budget too much. This will involve having more meals prepared ahead of time so that we can save the occasional money that we use on take-out for more real food bulk purchases!

My financial goal is to establish a realistic budget and follow it so that I won’t be struggling as much as I’m. It will be difficult being as the expenses FAR outweigh the resources avail (I.E. Income, etc). I’m a single-mother to the most precious 5 1/2 year old, Francesca! I’d love to maintain a comfortable financial stability so that my daughter can have just as good a life as anyone else. I don’t want to be limited per a single-parent household. Winning a copy of your book will help me in my quest for financial stability, etc. If I am not lucky enough to get the book, I’m still SO VERY lucky to have access to all the resources provided by you! I’m SO thankful for all of you’re hard work. Its free help to me and free is what I need but I know that ‘free help’ doesn’t exist w/out MUCH efforts from you! Thank you once again 4 all u do!!!

Our goal is to reduce our non-set expenses, like groceries and household expenses. Also pay for EVERYTHING with money we have. No using credit!! We’ve been great with this for at a year and want to keep it up. We need to start a new to us car savings too.

One of my primary goals is to pay off my one credit card. It’s for emergencies, travel and online purchases that get paid off at the end of the month. Last summer, my mother had an emergency that involved me traveling 3000 miles to her (with my two young children), and racked up $1100 (!!! ) Somehow, it seems to be the last thing we pay on… That’s GOT to go!

Would love to win a copy of Crystal’s book! One of my financial goals this year is to pay cash for a partial bathroom remodel. My husband and I have been using the kids’ bathroom for a year now b/c our tiled shower has water damage behind the tiles. As usual, life has ‘happened’ and the shower has been put off and off… Crystal’s story, and yours, have been inspiring! Thanks so much for this opportunity!

Our goals are to get rid of all outstanding debt – tame the grocery budget so that we can pay cash for a new car. Once all that is done – we want to open our own business and stop relying on other employers.

I have a few financial goals this year, some of them are to watch my spending more diligently, use cash at the grocery store and stick to the grocery budget, and pay off the last of the small debts we have.
Thanks for the opportunity to win the book!

My one big goal is to pay off our credit card and then not use it again. We don’t have much credit card debt but we do pay off our card and then start using it again. I want to get off that roller coaster and stay off.

My biggest financial goal for this year and next is to really build my kids college fund–I plan to put every extra nickle in that! I am going to be diligent in cutting our families budget & add that money to college savings. I have a freshman & a junior! Yikes

The main thing we are changing this year financially is . . . That after almost 20 years of me doing our finances . . . My hubby will be taking over!! I NEVER would have thought this would have happened in our lives (as I’ve always LOVED managing money) but God has other plans! He’s been working on both of our hearts regarding this issue for some time. It’s awesome (yet challenging) to see both of us stepping into totally new roles with this.
As for a financial goal . . . We are trusting God and seeking him for ways to be able to afford to send 2 more of our kids to private school next fall. We are also praying and seeking his wisdom for my blogs (as it would be wonderful to actually make a little money to support what I love doing . . . Reaching out to and ministering to women!)

Our goal this year is to start a budget so that we can start saving more for our future and the our twins’ college education. We would also like to start saving to go back to Ethiopia, which is our children’s birth country. We brought them home August 2010 and absolutely fell in love with the country and the people and cannot wait to go back.

We’ve had some big changes to our finances in 2011 when our youngest got sick and has needed extensive care. We’re buying a new house to accommodate her needs and the bills are adding up! It’s time to make some big changes.

Our youngest daughter has a congenital malformation that requires three more oral surgeries (we’ve gotten through the first oral surgery and braces-now she needs a gum graft, then a bone graft and finally an implant) We have no health or dental insurance but it doesn’t matter because when we did have insurance, neither dental nor health insurance paid for her first oral surgery. So there’s almost $6000.00 out of pocket. I also need a surgery which will probably be around $5000.00 if all goes well and there are no complications. Our goal is to be able to pay for all of this within the year, and have no lingering debt from it. It’s doable as long as the economy doesn’t get any worse (self employed).

I am on Dave Ramsey’s Baby Step #2 and I plan on paying off my car loan and a good portion of my student loan by the end of this year! Then it’s just a few month’s of paying my husband’s car loan before we are onto Baby Step #3!

So financial goal for the year? I guess I can’t think that long term right now. My goal for February is that I am praying for God to provide the money we need to pay our bills for February. My Hubby has been out of a job basically since October and the money has been coming in through the holidays. He’s paid everything for January but we don’t have enough for February so I am praying and watching for God to provide. That is my goal if you can call it a goal.

One of my mine goals is to actually start using my ledger again fully! I do a nice job recording checks for bills, but I rarely record my debit card purchases. So far, I have recorded everything from the past week.

We have decided to take hold of our finances in 2012! We have created a budget and have decided to pay cash for as much as possible (I too refuse to pay cash for gas, can’t leave 2 babies in the car to go inside and I am not taking them in!).
We are taking baby steps so that we can succeed, I don’t want to change too much too fast and get overwhelmed!

I follow Life as a Mom in Facebook. I just finished putting together my house notebook with forms from your book so I’m trying to organize my time with two kids. Now, I need to attack the anxiety related to managing the house budget. My goal this year is work on keeping a better track of the expenses related to groceries and miscellaneous, and have a better system to distribute the monthly budget and register the expenses for the year.

We would like to build up our savings and pay down our house (our only debt). I plan to finish my masters this summer …which I have fully paid for as I go. Then we hope to figure out what to do with our “extra” money.

my financial goal for this year is to stick to our budget and we are currently paying 70% of our income toward debt. We are on a limited income so according to our quicken plan we will be debt free including mortgage in 4 years and 6 months from now. It is hard to stay the course. But my focus this year is to be content with what I have and to keep separate “Need vs Want”. Lord willing we will achieve our goals. Thank you for your inspiration.

I love and appreciate all that I have learned and gained from both of you over the past year or more. One of our financial goals for this year are to be 100% committed to a true budget as well as the envelope system.

I would so love to win a copy of this book. I am retired and trying to get out of debt. It’s really hard when one is on a fixed income, but I am hoping there will be some good tips for everyone. Thank you.

One of my financial goals is to have a budget meeting with my husband at the begining of every month. We are tracking our finances using Dave’s mytotalmoneymakeover.com. We are already reaping the benefits. I wanted to go out and purchase MSM’s book, but I’m out of blow $ for the month! If I don’t win a copy, I’m certainly looking forward to buying it next month.

My financial goal this year is to stop buying on impulse. If I want to purchase something. I need to wait 1 day. If I still feel I must have the item, then I will go back for it. I believe this will cut out my extra spending.

My first goal is to pay for culinary school without having to get more student loans and add to the debt from previous student loans. Pay off some of the debt I’ve already accrued. Have enough money to build an emergency fund. Begin saving up for a trip to Disney World with my 2 girls.

Thanks so much for participating in this conversation about "a mom's life."

This is a place where moms can be themselves. Remember that each mother's path looks a little different. Please keep your comments respectful and kind. Reasonable minds will disagree in a nice way.

So let's talk about it, using "our big girl words."

Welcome to Life as MOM! I'm FishMama, chief cook and bottle washer around here. I have six kids under 18, and I've lived to tell the tale. Want to know how to make the most out of what you have where you are? You've come to the right place.

Archives

RECENT POSTS

Disclaimer

Please note that the advertisements posted here do not necessarily represent FishMama's views and opinions.
Also be advised that some of these advertising partners may use cookies and web beacons on our site (when you click through). I have no control over this. You should consult the respective privacy policies of these third-party ad servers for more detailed information on their practices as well as for instructions about how to opt-out of certain practices.